Dr. Beckford is currently a Physicist (Program Manager) at the U.S. Dept. of Energy, Office of Science, Office of High Energy Physics. In this role, he is responsible for leading the Intensity Frontier and the U.S. Japan Research programs in High Energy Physics and RENEW-HEP initiative.  He serves as a recognized scientific authority and expert in the area of experimental particle physics for intensity frontier research. His responsibilities include preparing, justifying, and supporting the portions of the Office’s budget relating to experimental particle physics intensity frontier measurements. 

Brian grew up in Miami after moving from Jamaica and was a graduate of the Design and Architecture Senior High (D.A.S.H). He was part of the second cohort of Ronald E. McNair Scholars at Florida International University and received his Bachelors of  Science in Physics. Dr. Beckford later earned his Master in Physics at Florida International University and was awarded the College of Arts & Sciences, Outstanding Academic Achievement as a Graduate Student in Physics. 

He was a recipient of the competitive Super Doctor Fellowship to study at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan and also was also awarded the Tohoku Kaihatsu Memorial Foundation Research Fellowship in 2011. Dr. Beckford earned a Ph.D. in nuclear physics from Tohoku University in 2013. His research interests are strangeness nuclear physics, rare decays, physics beyond the standard model, and instrumentation. 

Dr. Brian Beckford served as the APS Bridge Program project manager in the Department of Education and Diversity for the American Physical Society (APS) in College Park, Maryland. The program focuses on increasing the number of physics PhDs awarded to statitically underrepresented minority (URM) students.  I am advocate for providing opportunities to underserved and stastitically underrepresented communities in STEM fields, and for inclusive and equitable practices in physics and astronomy.

Before his current appointment, he was an assistant research scientist following a two-year(2017-2019) President's Postdoctoral Fellowship (PPFP) at the University of Michigan, Department of Physics. Dr. Beckford worked on the KOTO experiment, conducted at the J-PARC facility in Japan, which is designed to measure the rare CP-violating decay of a neutral long-lived kaon into a neutral pion and a neutrino anti-neutrino pair. Kaon decays are known examples of charge-parity (CP) violation. CP symmetry refers to the idea that there should be an equal amount of matter and antimatter (particles and antiparticles) in the universe, yet observations indicate that matter dominates. CP violation occurs when the probability of a particle's decay into other particles is different from the probability that its antiparticle will decay into the mirror antiparticles, so the CP violation expected in this experiment should provide some insight into the imbalance between matter and antimatter.  In 2020, he was the recipient of University of Michigan, Women in Science and Engineering Program's Claudia Joan Alexander Trailblazer Award.  

In 2022, he was awarded the American Physical Society (APS) Excellence in Physics Education Award.  In 2025, Dr. Beckford was elected to serve on the American Physical Society (APS) Board of Directors from 2026-2029. In 2026, he was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) by the Forum on Physics and Society For ensuring scientific excellence, shaping the landscape of physics through experimental high energy physics, and supporting the next generation of physicists.